January 2014 | In This Issue

Feature

Coming Together in Silicon Valley to Make Internet of Things History

From punch cards to PCs, the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California offers a look at how quickly computing has become central to our lives. That history will move in many new directions in the future, and one of them— the Internet of Things— was the subject of a two-day workshop in November organized by IEEE Standards Association. This was the latest in a series of Internet of Things (IoT) workshops that have spanned the globe from the U.S. to Europe and China and brought together industries from automotive to electronics to energy.

“The goal was to engage industry. If you look at participants, over 90% were representatives from industry, with a pretty significant level of representation from senior engineers and executive staff,” says Oleg Logvinov, member of the IEEE-SA Standards Board and Corporate Advisory Group and Director of Market Development at STMicroelectronics’ Industrial & Power Conversion Division. Despite the different verticals that participants came from, Logvinov says, “one of the important messages was how many elements are similar across verticals. There’s a need for industry to work together to create economies of scale and a unified approach.”

Logvinov cites data visualization as one example of an overarching technology that needs a unified approach. “Many applications for data visualization, like streaming your security camera to your phone, carry with them serious privacy concerns. We need to work together to provide multiple layers of data abstraction for different applications.”

Participation was enthusiastic from all sides, according to Logvinov— “It was fantastic that many presenters came to present but were delighted to stay for the entire two days. That’s the greatest compliment,” he says. Though IEEE is the leading organizer globally for IoT events, “the event wouldn’t have been possible if it was just IEEE. We came together with industry to address their needs.”

Two more workshops are planned for 2014: one in Seoul in March at the IEEE World Forum on Internet of Things, and another in the fall at a location to be announced soon.

Knowing How Good That Camera Phone Really Is

Cameras have long been in a megapixel marketing arms race, but a single number doesn’t cover the complex intersection of issues relating to image quality for camera phones. For a still camera the best quality image is the most detailed one, but for a camera phone, it’s more likely to be the one that is cleverest about fooling the eye with compression while maintaining a realistic frame rate.

To create more meaningful metrics for consumers in selecting a camera phone, in 2012 IEEE took over a standards effort called CPIQ and has carried on its work under the designation IEEE P1858™, Standard for Camera Phone Image Quality.

“What we’re defining is unique to the mobile phone space,” explains IEEE’s George John. “ISO has defined metrics for the digital camera itself, but there are many other quality issues relating to mobile.” At the same time, John says, the worlds of cameras and camera phones are rapidly converging. “There’s a lot of interest in what we’re doing from makers of DSLR and point and shoot cameras, which are increasingly built with network capabilities.”

“IEEE P1858 is approaching publication of its first draft sometime early in 2014, says John. And the effort has drawn wide interest from companies in both photography and communications, from Google, AT&T, Broadcom and Microsoft to camera phone manufacturers, OS vendors, image quality test labs and more.

The last group— testing labs— will be an ongoing focus as the 1858 standard continues to evolve. As certifications under the standard become more common, ICAP, a joint effort of IEEE-SA and IEEE-ISTO, is looking toward creating a conformity assessment program, with the prospect of a rating system or other tools for consumer education and marketing down the road.

Green Entry Control on a Community Scale

An important part of the standards sector has always been that ideas that come from anywhere can be made available for application everywhere. An example of that in action right now is IEEE 1888™, Standard For Ubiquitous Green Community Control Network Protocol, in which a technology developed for local conditions in China is now finding application worldwide. The base standard was published in 2011, and three additional standards are now in the process of moving to publication by early 2014.

With rapid development happening throughout China, and energy production in a constant state of working to keep up, it’s critical for new developments to be as energy efficient as possible. "There are more than 40 billion square meters of building floor space in China, and we are adding two billion square meters annually," said Mr. Liu Dong, IEEE 1888 Working Group chair. "Most of them are high energy consumption buildings, occupying nearly 50 percent of total energy consumption in the society."

The IEEE 1888 series will help large commercial buildings to use less energy and have a smaller environmental footprint through remote surveillance, operation, management and maintenance. IEEE 1888.1, which describes network gateway access, system architecture and other aspects of the underlying structure, and IEEE 1888.3, which covers security management, are complete and have been published, while IEEE 1888.2, covering network convergence and scalability, should be approved in March, along with a minor revision to the base standard, says IEEE’s Soo Kim.

Making the Best Connection From the Device’s Point of View

Which form of communications works the best at any given moment? Most of the time our devices connect through a single form of communication, such as wi-fi. But when you’re on the move, or when conditions are changing, it can be more effective to take advantage of different network connections dynamically.

“In many radio systems, the user chooses the best link, switching or combining connections as needed. Or that kind of decision can be distributed from the network side,” says Masayuki Ariyoshi of IEEE in Japan. The downside of this is that “there is no intersystem optimization across types of connections. Each system has in its specs to try to optimize, but there’s no optimization between different forms of access.”

Masayuki says that the extension of IEEE 1900.4 in the new standard has been greeted enthusiastically by everyone involved— network operators, manufacturers, universities and telecom providers. “In my view there is very good harmonization between all of these participants,” he says.

Articles of Interest

Ever notice that during a sporting event, or parade, or local emergency—when we rely on our cellphones the most—calls are often dropped and text messages go undelivered? That’s because there are a limited number of radio frequencies for cellphone users in any one area. When a big event occurs, lines are flooded and networks can’t handle all the calls.

Congratulations to Mary Barra, who earlier this month was named the next chief executive of the world’s second-largest carmaker. She starts her new job in January. She currently is vice president of global manufacturing engineering in charge of engineering, design, and quality control. Barra began working for GM in 1980 as an 18-year old student. She needed money to help pay for tuition to General Motors Institute (now Kettering University), in Flint, Mich., where she earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering. She went on to earn a master’s degree in business administration from the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Forbes named Barra the 35th most powerful executive in its most recent ranking.

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